Aizawl, November 16: Manav Thakkar was on course for yet another title as he overcame determined fellow PSPB player Birdie Boro 4-3 (5-11, 10-12, 6-11, 11-3, 11-8, 11-4, 11-5) to enter the Youth Boys final in the 11Even Sports National Ranking (East Zone) Table Tennis Championships at the R Dengthuama Multipurpose Indoor Stadium at Mualpui here today.

Manav will take on Arjun Ghosh of West Bengal who blanked out Shubham Ojha of Rajasthan 4-0 (11-9, 11-8, 11-9, 11-8) in the final. 

In Youth Girls semifinals, West Bengal’s Priyadarshini Das scrapped through to the final when she defeated Tamil Nadu’s Amrutha Pushpak 4-3 (14-12, 12-10, 5-11, 12-10, 8-11, 8-11, 11-6) to clash with state mate Moumita Datta who downed another Tamil Nadu girl, Yashini Sivasankar 4-2 (13-11, 10-12, 11-5, 13-11, 8-11, 11-9).

Both the finals will be played later tonight.

Manav escaped a certain defeat when he pulled himself up after being down 0-3 to win the next four games on the trot. Boro, who had beaten Arjun Ghosh for the title in the South Zone at Visakhapatnam, let off a wonderful chance go by when Manav did what he does best in adverse situations. On the other hand, Arjun found an easy prey in Shubham who was always lagging behind in the first semifinal. 

Twice semifinalist this season, Amrutha lacked penetration when she was presented with opportunities during her semifinal against the West Bengal girl. It started with the extended first game and stretched up to the fourth, both of which Priyadarshini won. Yet, Amrutha managed to pull up her socks to level the score only to lose steam in the decider. 

However, her state mate Yashini has to blame herself for some unnecessary blemishes, including gifting away some easy points. It should be said to the credit of Moumita—she won two extended games to one of Yashini—who made most of her rival’s largesse and some power failure interruptions.  

Suthirtha ousted

Earlier, in a shock pre-quarterfinal exit top women’s seed Suthirtha Mukherjee went down to Reeth Rishya 10-12, 11-5, 8-11, 4-11, 0-11. It was one of the finest wins posted by Reeth this season, particularly because Suthirtha has three titles this season. 

Fifth seed Ankita Das followed her, bowing out to Maharahtra qualifier Manushree Patil 12-10, 9-11, 9-11, 5-11, 11-5, 11-5, 8-11, unseeded former national champion K. Shamini beat sixth seed Pooja Sahasrabuddhe 11-4, 11-8, 11-8, 6-11, 4-11, 11-8 and AAI’s Ayhika Mukherjee accounted for seventh seed Krittwika Sinha Roy 12-10, 11-7, 11-6, 3-11, 10-12, 11-5. 

Eighth seeded Divya Deshpande survived a scare from Telangana’s Nikhat Banu before winning 9-11, 5-11, 11-9, 11-8, 11-9, 10-12, 11-5. Mouma Das, seeded fifth, struggled to win against Railway’s Takeme Sarkar 7-11, 6-11, 11-3, 11-3, 11-7, 11-6 while Mousumi Paul beat Seleenadeepthi Selvakumar of AAI 4-1, even as second seed Madhurika Patkar extracted a similar verdict against Swetha Kumaravel of Karnataka.

In men’s singles pre-quarterfinals, Sanil Sehtty beat Raj Mondal 4-1, Nitin Thiruvengadam downed local boy Lalhunhlua 4-0, Devesh Karia defeated Birdie Boro 4-1, Subhajit Saha won over Arjun Ghosh 4-1 and Manav Thakkar accountd for Sanish Ambekar 4-1. 

But third seed Anthony Amalraj struggled to overcome LIC’s Sougata Sarkar 6-11, 3-11, 11-3, 11-2, 12-10, 10-12, 11-4 in a gruelling match which saw the return of Amalraj to the domestic scene after skipping three consecutive events. Abhishek Yadav got a scare from Delhi’s Utkarsh Gutpa before advancing with a 11-13, 5-11,5-11, 12-10, 13-11, 12-10, 11-9 win while Sudanshu Grover continued with his big match struggle but managed to beat Maharashtra’s Siddesh Pande 11-9, 11-8, 9-11, 11-6, 6-11, 11-2. 

The men and women play their quarterfinals tonight followed by their semifinals and finals tomorrow along with the Junior Boys and Junior Girls finals.